Filed under: Widget Watch
Widget Watch: Carpenter's level
Now this is a
cool widget. The Carpenter's Level is a Dashboard widget that
responds to your (so equipped) iBook or Powerbook's built-in motion detector. Tilt your laptop to the left or right and
watch the bubble move. This widget has been written to go to "sleep" when Dashboard is inactive, so don't
worry about it continually monitoring your laptop's position in space. I don't have an iBook or Powerbook that I could try this with, so if you do, please post your experience in the comments. If you're a carpenter who actually gives this a try on the job site, we definitely want to hear from you.
[Via Daring Fireball]
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
FinlandHorray said 7:15AM on 1-23-2006
There's nothing like impressing my lesser Windoze-equipped friends by showing them Carpenters Level in action... ;)
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Tomm said 7:26AM on 1-23-2006
Wow, that's awesome. Just tried it on my 12" PB and it works perfectly! I will now amaze friends and family alike who have never heard of sudden motion sensors. Nice find!
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Michael said 7:26AM on 1-23-2006
This is hilarious. Utterly pointless, but hilarious.
Actually, I guess if you've ever wondered whether the cafe table you're writing on is quite level, then this may be just the answer you've never been looking for.
I've got a recent iBook and it does exactly as you would expect. Very neat hack.
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Chris said 7:32AM on 1-23-2006
I want tetris to work with this!
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Brad said 7:49AM on 1-23-2006
Hmm...the desk that I'm currently typing at isn't level...
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Tomm said 7:54AM on 1-23-2006
On further playing I don't think it's calibrated properly. It needs terre-ing. I guess the in-built sensor isn't made to be 100% accurate. Either that or my house isn't level, hehe. This could have some interesting applications though, more useful even than a spirit level perhaps.
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MikeV said 8:04AM on 1-23-2006
So... how long ago did Apple start putting these motion sensors in? My 15" 1.5GHz Powerbook doesn't seem to work with this widget, or at least it didn't appear to change as I moved my Powerbook around... bought Aug. 2004.
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Graham said 8:14AM on 1-23-2006
Oh my gosh! This is the coolest thing ever! Works perfectly on my Hi-Res 15" PowerBook.
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dave said 8:36AM on 1-23-2006
This is a neat widget and I'm just as happy as the next guy that my PowerBook has a motion sensor, but c'mon, IBM laptops have had the same feature forever now. There's even an animated laptop that wobbles in sync with the actual computer.
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Guilherme said 8:55AM on 1-23-2006
WOW!!!
amazing!
does exactly what it should
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Tomm said 9:33AM on 1-23-2006
In reply to MikeV, I believe Apple put these into the latest iBooks, and the January (?) 05 revision of the PB. The ones just before the hi-res ones. I think.
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kisco said 9:51AM on 1-23-2006
nice widget !
It's as funny as the application "Stable window" :
http://kisco.free.fr/download/stable_window_demo_ibook.mp4
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Matt Rodkey said 11:22AM on 1-23-2006
I saw David Pogue demonstrate this at a the SF Apple Store during MWSF. Very funny!! Not only is it a cool widget, its a built in Joke for a presenter using powerbook :)
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Louis C. said 11:56PM on 1-23-2006
@Guilherme: Of course it does. It's not made by Microsoft.
Very cool :)
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Brian said 11:58PM on 1-23-2006
The widget really only works as a level if your computer was level when you started the widget. The motion sensors in the PowerBooks are really accelerometers, not position/rotation sensors. In other words, they detect when the machine is changing speed. In order to obtain the orientation of the computer, you need to integrate the acceleration data over time twice, so there's bound to be some error, too.
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Alan said 12:13AM on 1-24-2006
Neat program.
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Christian Gehrke said 10:36AM on 1-24-2006
I have a 15 inch 1.25 ghz powerbook and it doesn't work either. Oh well. Would be cool but I think I will live without it.
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Davidlow said 12:35PM on 1-24-2006
Feature Request: (Even though I don't actually have a motion detector in my PowerBook):
Have it detect forward-backward tilting as well as left-right. The challenge would be to create the visualization for this.
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CSR said 1:22PM on 1-24-2006
RE: Davidlow - you could have the widget zoom in and out depending on how you tilted the laptop forward or back.
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Noface said 2:45AM on 1-27-2006
I have a 12" ibook and i get no bubble, I have the motion sensor though...
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